Touch panels, attached on display elements such as liquid crystal display elements, have been researched and developed, as one of the input means for liquid crystal display devices, etc. A touch panel of this type normally includes a flat-plate electrode formed on an insulative substrate such as a glass substrate for detecting the contact position based on an electric signal that is influenced by changes in capacitance occurring when a contact object is brought into contact with the panel surface.
Since an electrode in a panel surface used in a touch panel as described above is required to have a high resistance and a high transmittance, a thin transparent conductive film such as an ITO film (thickness: about 100 Å) has been mainly used as disclosed in, for example, Patent Document 1, Patent Document 2, etc.    Patent Document 1: Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2003-099192    Patent Document 2: Japanese Laid-Open Patent Publication No. 2002-014772